"Get Smart" The Not-So-Great Escape: Part 1 (1969)

User Rating:

8.5/10   

Director:

Don Adams

Writers:

Arne Sultan (written by) and
Chris Hayward (written by) ...

TV Series:

"Get Smart" (1965)

Original Air Date:

22 March 1969 (Season 4, Episode 25)

Genre:

Comedy | Crime | Mystery

Plot:

Agents are disappearing at the airport and that includes the Chief. Max trails them to a KAOS POW camp in New Jersey. Max infiltrates the camp, but is caught. |

Plot Keywords:

Agent | Secret Agent | Gadget | Shoe | Secret Plan

Cast

Don Adams	...	Maxwell Smart
Barbara Feldon	...	Agent 99
Edward Platt	...	Chief
King Moody	...	Starker
Kathie Browne	...	Airport Girl
Johnny Haymer	...	Nova
John S. Ragin	...	Kendall (as John Ragin)
Robert Karvelas	...	Larabee
William Yarmy	...	Old Timer
Bernie Kopell	...	Siegfried

Runtime:

Argentina:30 min

Certification:

Argentina:Atp

Filming Locations:

Paramount Studios - 5555 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA

Trivia:

Hymie the Robot (Richard Gautier) was supposed to appear in this episode. But Gauthier was unavailable so his part was deleted.

Goofs:

Continuity: When the POWs are running from the barracks to line up for the appel, the Chief is not one of the men running, yet in the next cut, as the men are lined up, he is in the front row of prisoners.

Quotes:

Siegfried: [Starker is blowing raspberries with his mouth in imitation of motorcycles] Eh, Starker, this is KAOS we don't
[makes the same raspberry sound]
Siegfried: here.

Movie Connections:

Features "Get Smart: Rub-A-Dub-Dub... Three Spies in a Sub (#2.9)" (1966)

Stalag 17

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Arne Sultan and Chris Hayward end season four with one of their best scripts of the season. Smart must escort CONTROL agent Kendall (John S. Ragin--odd he doesn't get a number) to the airport where he is supposed to fly to Europe to deliver top secret defense plans to the allies. However, Kendall disappears while making a phone call. Outraged he let Kendall disappear, the Chief makes Max take him through a step by step recreation of what happened to Kendall---and then he disappears too! Soon only Max, 99 and Larabee are left at CONTROL. After a funny scene in trying to decide who is to be the acting Chief of CONTROL (Robert Karvelas is doing great with his role beefed up!) Max decides the only thing to do is allow himself to be kidnapped as well. So he goes into the mystery phone booth as well...only to discover KAOS doesn't seem to want him! He has Larabee page him, trying to make him sound more important. This leads to Smart discovering the KAOS operation being run by the beautiful Kathie Browne (who played Deela on "Star Trek" in the episode "Wink of an Eye") and Nova (Johnny Haymer). Max subdues the two and learns 22 CONTROL agents have been sent to a prison camp in New Jersey run by Siegfried (Bernie Kopell). 86 decides to try and infiltrate by disguising himself as Kessler, "the Beast of Buenos Aires".

The jokes are all very crisp and the show has none of the flat, tired feeling a lot of the early season four shows seem to have had. Credit not only the script, but some excellent direction by Don Adams. He seems to have been re-energized somewhere in the middle of the season. There's a BIG difference between the shows early in season four and the later ones. It's too bad NBC decided to drop the series after this. But the quality of this and the "King of Caronia" episodes proved "Get Smart" still had a lot of comic life left in it.

Look for one of the prisoners Smart calls "old timer". That's his dad, William Yarmy!